Looks like some new blocks fell off the Iron Man wall. It must have been recent the blocks were completely dry on topwhere everything else is stillcovered in snow and the ground was torn up quite a bit. A few small rocks came down while we were checking it out so we moved on.

I was out at Main Cliff yesterday, and didn't notice anything out of the ordinary, so it must have happened Saturday night. There was a lot of water coming off the top of the cliff during the day on Saturday.

Spring is definitely the time for it. Actually, looking back through the forums, I see that the massive rockfall happened in March of 2010.

It sure looks like something new. Did you happen to take a picture of the cliff? There is a big roof block right near the top, just above where the huge rockfall of 2010 came out that is highly suspect. It is at the top between Ironman and Rock du Jours. I was checking out a potential new route up there years back and couldn't get it off with a big bar, but it looked like it would only be a matter of time.

People shouldn't take their safety for granted hanging out below the Main Cliff. Don't let all those nice bolts fool you. It is still an evolving cliff. Per square foot it may be as bad or worse than Cannon. I have personally trundled car sized stuff from it that came off scarily easily.

Hmmm, it could have come down the Rock du Jour gully. There was some potentially loose stuff up on the ledge. The roof block I mentioned is still there in your picture. People should be aware that there is stuff up high where the third pitch of Ironman used to top out that could be getting more loose with the freeze/thawing too.

Wow... scary. I was up there on Saturday the 15th and I didn't notice any rockfall, so yeah it must've been pretty recent. I admit, I have taken the safety of Main Cliff for granted, its easy to get lulled into a false sense of security by all that solid-looking quartzite. Did this block land to the left or to the right of Magic Helmet?

The Main Wall is as "active" a cliff in terms of rockfall as Cannon? Gee whiz . . . Back when I was climbing on Cannon, it was a relatively common occurrence to see new seasonal detritus at the base of the cliff. ("I love the smell of sulphur in the morning.")

I'm relatively new to climbing at Rumney. How common is this sort of substantial rockfall that we see in the picture? And is there a season that is particularly active? I'd guess late winter/early spring for sure with our New England freeze and thaw cycles. Thanks for any info.

Nick, as with anywhere, the most active time for rockfall is late winter and early spring when everything thaws. Im relatively new to outdoor climbing, ive been climbing at Rumney for maybe 18 months and this is the first big rockfall ive heard of in that time (other than the collapse of Jolt). Main Cliff does seem to be much more active than the rest of Rumney, but I have always reasonably felt safe there until now. Big rockfall does happen at Rumney, such as the fall of the big flake on Slick and the March 2010 incident, so im starting to consider avoiding Main Cliff until early April just to be safe

Mark and the rest of Team Tough would know for sure .... to me, Main Cliff is pretty "active". I would think crags like Meadows, 5.8, Bonsai, New Wave are "safer" in terms of large rock falls. OC looks scary but I think Ward and company did such a stellar job trundling and cleaning that I think it is "less active" than Main Cliff. The big crash of 2010 is the largest I can remember going back to '95 or so but I have to admit my memory is not what it used to be ....

Nope. We were going to go up tomorrow to see if we could do some clean up of obvious loose stuff, but postponed for possibly next week due to the frigid temps. Hopefully it will be a little more reasonable temps for rapping off the top with bars. If so, we will have to close the cliff and the hillside below for a while while we do it.

We can post a few signs to forewarn the community about a volunteer based effort to trundle loose blocks at Main Cliff. When we set a date to do this we also need to have two people serving as lookouts because we can't rely solely on signs to warn folks. Once the activity is over we will remove the signs. Let me know how I can help.

Safety at any climbing area is never certain. That said, Main Cliff does not experience regular rockfall. The two rockfall events over the past 3 years have been outliers, although significant ones. Practice caution.

At what point do the outliers become the trend? There's definitely been an uptick in rockfall reports from Main Cliff lately.

More important is being aware of your surroundings and knowing where to keep your hang out time to a minimum. A helmet is not going to do anything if a two ton block lands on your head. You want to limit the odds of a falling rock hitting your head in the first place. They are not a bad idea for the small stuff though, like gravel and dropped quickdraws.

Before you drop your pack and sprawl out with your back to the wall, observe what is above you and possible trajectories of stuff bouncing its way down. Are you in a protected spot?

I would rather see a person with no helmet who is aware of their surroundings than a helmet clad one who seems to think wearing one will protect them from being out of it.